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DELIVERED BEFORE THE 



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OGLETHORPE UNIVERSITY, 



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f) THE ANNUAL COMMENCEMENT, 

iTu.Xy SOtiL, 1853, 



BY 



HENRY M. LAW, ESQ. 



GEORGE N. NICHOLS, BOOK AND JOB PRINTER. 
1853. 






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CORRESPONDENCE. 



THALIAN HALL, JULY 20th, 1853. 
Mr. Henry M. Law : 

Sir : — In behalf of the Society we represent, and for the pleasure and gratification 

of those who heard, and the instruction and guidance of all who are ambitious of 

drinking deep at the great fountain of eloquence, we earnestly solicit a copy of your 

highly appropriate and eloquent Oration, this day delivered before the two Literary 

Societies of Oglethorpe University. Hoping that you will waive all considerations of 

a personal character, and yield to the wishes of the Society and public, 

We remain ; yours respectful ly, 

J. L CUNNING, ) 

W. T. BRYAN, > Committee. 

W. T. M. DICKSON,) 



MIDWAY, JULY 20th, 1853. 
Gentlemen: — In reply to your communication, requesting for publication a copy of 
the Address I had the honor to deliver before the Literary Societies of Oglethorpe 
University, I have only to say that it is at your disposal. 

Be pleased to present my grateful acknowledgments to the Thalian Society for the 
indulgence extended to my imperfect effort, and accept for yourselves, gentlemen, my 
thanks for the complimentary manner in which you have been pleased to allude to it. 
I am, with great respect, your obedient servant, 

HENRY M. LAW. 
To Messrs. J. L. Cunning, W. T. Bryan, and W. T. M. Dickson, Committee. 



ADDRESS. 



•• 



Gentlemen of the Phi Delta and Thalian Societies : 

At the close of another accademic year, the voice of this 
Literary Institution has again summoned the friends of edu- 
cation and the votaries of learning, to this, her annual festival. 
Responding to the call, they have laid aside the cares and 
avocations of life, and gathered within these classic portals 
to banquet for a season upon the stores of her bounty". 

To him whom your kindness has honored with an invita- 
tion to address you, the occasion is replete with merest, and 
suggestive of affecting associations. It revives with much 
of their original freshness, the pleasing and grateful reminis- 
cences of the past. As he surveys the gay and animating 
spectacle before him, memory transports him back to the 
cherished scenes of his own accademic career — so reluctant- 
ly exchanged for the strife and turmoil of a bustling world, 
when the love of letters first inflamed his youthful soul, and 
knowledge first revealed her blandishments and disclosed 
her charms. He re-treads in fancy the once familiar walks of 
his own alma mater, and lives over anew those halcyon 
hours, when the heart first throbbed and palpitated to the 
gushing sympathies of early friendship, or thrilled with a 
keen delight to the rapturous day-dreams of young ambition. 
Among the reflections naturally awakened by the 
presence of a band of aspiring scholars, the contemplative 
mind will instinctively pause to meditate upon the closeness 
of that alliance which springs from mutual studies and kin- 
dred pursuits. How refined and intimate are the ties which 
unite such a brotherhood — the warm emotions which pervade 
your generous bosoms upon this Commencement occasion 
will most eloquently attest. Here, amid these retired groves, 
you have devoted the bloom and elasticity of youth to the 



development of the intellect and the discipline of your men- 
tal powers. Now, urging your toilsome course along the 
rugged track of science, and anon turning your footsteps 
into the smooth and flowery paths of literature. Here, 
within this tranquil retreat of learning you have drunk to- 
gether from the pure fountains of classic lore, and pondered 
over the chaste and elegant models of antiquity. Here 
you have held lofty converse with the mighty spirits of the 
past, and communed with the renowned heroes and sages of 
other times and other lands — their immortal thoughts and 
famous deeds. Here, hand-in-hand, you have explored the 
rich and teeming mines of History — ranged the luxuriant and 
variegated fields of Rhetoric and Belles Letters, or roamed 
amid the blooming gardens and lingered by the castalean 
streams of Poetry. 

To some of you, Gentlemen, it will be permitted to pro- 
long for a season the pleasures of this delightful intercourse. 
But I am reminded by the impressive and affecting cere- 
monies which we have just witnessed, that there are others 
among your number who have reached the period which 
is to terminate this sweet and ennobling companionship. 
Perchance the hour of your departure from these venerable 
walls, as you go hence to join the restless throng without, 
and mingle in the stirring contests of life, may mark, with 
some of you, a last and final seperation — the lines of your 
destiny never again to meet — your pathways through the 
world never to intersect — the joys of an earthly re-union 
never more to be renewed. As you muse upon the pain- 
ful thought, and meditate the severance of those tender 
ties which bind you to this sympathetic band, methinks a 
pensive influence must cast its shade upon your spirits and 
your touched and softened hearts must feelingly respond to 
the sentiment so beautifully expressed by a native poet — 

" When envious Time, with unrelenting hand, 
Dissolves the union of some little band, 
A band connected by those hallowed ties, 
That from the birth of lettered friendship rise, 
Each lingering soul, before the parting sigh, 
One moment waits to view the years gone by- 
Memory still loves to hover o'er the place. 
And all our pleasures, all our pains retrace." 



But although you cannot be insensible to those emotions 
m of regret awakened by your departure from these favorite 
haunts, you may find much to mitigate the keenness of their 
sting, in the reflection that this golden season of literary 
companionship will afford a refreshing retrospect in advanc- 
ing years, while the tastes which have been acquired will 
prove the unfailing sources of enjoyment and delight. 
Whatever may betide you in the changes and vicissitudes of 
life, be assured that these scenes of your collegiate career 
will linger, like fragrant memories, in after hours, and the 
pleasures of learning, with the precious stores which have 
here been garnered, will cleave to you throughout your pil- 
grimage — soothing the cares of your manhood, and minis- 
tering consolation and solice to your declining years : 

" Not the gay transient moments of delight, 
Not hurried transports felt but in their flight. 
Unlike "all else, the student's joys endure, 
Intense, expansive, energetic, pure, 
Whether o'er classic plains he loves to rove, 
Midst attic bowers, or thro' the mountain grove, 
$ His are the joys no stranger breast can feel, 

No wit define, no utterance reveal." 

Yes ! In those desolate moments, when misfortune, dis- 
appointment, and disease, perhaps the wreck of many a 
cherished hope, shall have conspired to dispel the illusions of 
fancy, and chill the enthusiasm of the soul, then will the 
friendships here nurtured, the aspirations here indulged, and 
the springs of improvement here revealed revive, arrayed 
in all their early attractions, to cheer and beguile the loneli- 
ness of your age. 

But I turn from these pleasing meditations to the consider- 
ation of a subject which I have been induced to select from 
the force of its claims upon an audience of American scholars. 
I mean that art which was the favorite pursuit of the illus- 
trious Tully, and upon which he pronounced the splendid 
encomium of being the consummation of every other ; yea, 
that noble art, the revival of whichhas been one of the proud- 
est and fairest trophies of republican liberty — the nurture 
of which is her darling care, and the perfection of which is 
D at once her shield and spear. 



Upon a theme which has employed the most extensive 
learning and the most affluent genius of past ages, it would / 
be difficult to entertain you with much of the charm of novelty 
or the grace of originality . Yet, if I should happily succeed in 
the course of those reflections it will be my privilege to offer, 
in confirming your impressions of the dignity and importance 
of eloquence, though I should develope nothing essentially 
new, my aim will be accomplished and my endeavors realized. 

Before considering the properties and qualities neces- 
sary to the orator, it may prove interesting briefly to revert 
to the origin of his art, and succinctly to sketch its history. 
It would be a pleasing task, while lingering over the 
checkered volume of its fortunes, more particularly to discuss 
and illustrate the fostering influence of popular liberty 
in the advancement of eloquence, to exhibit her to your 
view in those more auspicious periods of her history, when after 
having languished for ages under the withering breath of tyr- 
anny, or lain crushed under the grinding heel of an iron des- 
potism, she has again come forth with renovated life amid the 
invigorating atmosphere and mountain gales of freedom; ' 
startling by her mighty thunders the cruel masters of power 
from their unholy dreams of dominion. But this topic 
has been so beautifully and ably developed during the past 
year by one of Georgia's distinguished sons* in the Annual 
Address before the Literary Societies of Franklin College, that 
I must content myself with this passing allusion to it. A 
rapid review of its history, however, will better prepare us 
for an examination into the elements and properties of the art. 

The records of the refined and opulent, though haughty 
and imperious nations of the East, furnish no specimens of 
the art worthy of attention. Egypt, the famous nursery of 
the arts and sciences, and the theatre of some of their most 
signal triumphs ; Carthage, for years the jealous rival of 
Rome, until the iron legions of the latter had torn the dia- 
dem from her brow, and wrested the sceptre from her grasp ; 
Persia, whose mercenary hirelings, buoyant with hope and 
flushed with confidence, marched forth to fertilize with their 
blood the sterile soil of Attica, afford no monuments of 

"Horn Wm. H. Stiles. 



» 



I) 



eloquence. The Grecian states were emphatically the first 
field upon which it appeared, and the republic of Athens 
the stage upon which it achieved its noblest victories and shone 
with its richest lustre. Fitting spot for the birth place of 
eloquence ! A land hallowed by the recollection of all that 
is ennobling in intellectual grandeur and inspiring in heroic 
enterprise — all that is fascinating in the trophies of art, and 
all that is thrilling in the beauties of song. The brilliant 
career of Athenian eloquence opened with the illustrious 
Pericles, and gradually advancing with the labors of a host 
of rhetoricians, whose names are already familiar to you, 
attained, in the matchless orations of Demosthenes, its me- 
ridian glory. In analysing the structure of that masterly 
style adopted by this renowned prince of orators, it will be 
found to have combined with all the finished elegance of the 
schools which preceded him, an unexampled infusion of mas- 
culine vigor and energy. Its distinguishing quality and pre- 
dominating element was a robust and manly strength, every- 
where abounding in graphic sentences and nervous periods, 
and marred by nothing frivolous or turgid. It was the out- 
pouring of passion, intense and burning, but never frantic — of 
enthusiasm, glowing and fiery, but never raving — of zeal, 
warm and ardent, but never extravagant. In the language 
of another, "it was rapid harmony, adapted to the sense — it 
was animated and vehement reasoning, without the appear- 
ance of art — it was disdain, anger, boldness, freedom, in- 
volved in a continued stream of the most cogent argument." 
Do I address any in this assembly ambitious of the high dis- 
tinction of the olive crown ? Let me commend to his 
earnest and faithful study this superb and noble model. In 
the unrivalled strains of the immortal champion of Ctesiphon 
he will behold a type and specimen of the loftiest and 
sublimest human eloquence. 

And from the example of the great Athenian, the story of 
his early failures, the difficulties ultimately conquered, and 
the embarrassments surmounted, the youthful aspirant for 
oratorical eminence may derive an instructive lesson to cheer 
and encourage him amid the toils of his opening career. 

Q 



10 

When with trembling step and fluttering pulses he ascends 
the rostrum, let him remember that that transcendant elo- 
quence which has filled the world with the fame of Demos- 
thenes was the gradual result of persevering exertions, 
stimulated by that "amor patriae, laudumque immensa 
cupido," which inspire all the bolder efforts of moral and 
intellectual energy. 

Sprung from a rude and barbarous origin, and reared in 
the sanguinary atrocities of war, the stern taste of the Ro- 
man republic rejected all the more elegant accomplishments 
of literature and the arts ; nor do we meet with any instances 
of oratorical excellence among them until the civilization of 
the conquered Greeks had softened the asperities of their 
primitive character. The celebrity of her earlier orators 
was soon destined to be eclipsed by the fuller and richer 
splendor of Cicero, that famous representative of Roman 
eloquence, to whom the signal honor was accorded— 

"Roma parentem y 
Ciceronem patrem patriae, libera dixit. " 

The whole range of classical literature scarcely affords a 
parallel to that captivating array of rhetorical graces which 
throughout adorn and embellish the productions of this great 
master. In beauty of conception, richness of imagery, ma- 
jestic elevation, and amplitude of style, these splendid ora- 
tions, which centuries ago enchained the Roman Senate to 
the melody of Tully's tones, continue to command the 
profound admiration of modern times. 

Such a mind, could it have sprung loose from the fetters 
of Heathenism, and been acted upon by the mighty motives 
and the stupendous themes which belong to the Christian 
pulpit, to what a sublimity of power might it not have 
soared. This great department of modern eloquence, how- 
ever, was unknown to antiquity. The immortality of the 
soul had, indeed, been dimly conjectured even by Cicero 
himself, but the absorbing and kindling truths of Christianity 
had not yet been revealed. And it is here, pre-eminently in 
this new sphere of the Christian ministry, that modern Elo- 
quence discovers its superior advantage. The advent of the 



11 

Gospel forms the grandest epoch in its history. The mission 
\) of Divine Truth opens its most imposing field. What, in the 
comparison, are the mutable fortunes of nations, or the fluc- 
tuating interests of empires or kingdoms ? The Senate and 
the Rostrum may lure her with the gilded pomp of earthly 
honors, but in the sacred oratory of the Pulpit, the voice of 
Eloquence will speak in nobler accents and more fervid tones 
than ever startled the Grecian Ecclesia, or shook the Roman 
forum. 

" There stands the messenger of Truth : there stands 
The legate of the skies ! His theme divine, 
His office sacred, his credentials clear. 
By him the violated law speaks out 
Its thunders ; and by him, in strains as sweet 
As angels use, the gospel whispers peace." 

Passing over the dreary waste of the middle ages, when 
the blighting influences of arbitrary rule prevailed, the British 
parliament of the 17th century was the next stage upon 
which the glory of the oratorical art was displayed. Time 
^ will not permit us to linger over the shining names which 
graced this period. The character of British eloquence, 
however, in a more recent day, may be traced in the gush- 
ing exuberance of Burke, the sparkling brilliancy of Sheri- 
dan, the glowing fire of Curran, in the terse and nervous 
energy of Grattan, the stately march of Erskine, the massive 
strength of Brougham, the abrupt impetuosity of Fox, and 
the sweeping vehemence of the great Earl of Chatham, that 
most powerful declaimer of the British parliament. 

But we have wandered so long wpon foi^eign soil, that we 
hasten our footsteps towards the land of our nativity. The 
rapid growth of the American mind, its achievements in 
science and arts, and its attainments in the walks of litera- 
ture, have successfully repelled the ungenerous sarcasm that 
ours is the clime "where Genius sickens and where Fancy 
dies." Young as the nation is, she has already exhibited, 
even in this her morning hour, for the admiration of man- 
kind, a noble galaxy of original and vigorous intellect. — 
Scholars, who have culled flowers of choicest hue and fra- 
grance from the fields of elegant taste and learning — His- 



12 

torians, who have recorded in graphic strains the story of our 
struggles and our triumphs — Statesmen, who have unfolded 
the true principles of legislative wisdom — Jurists, who have 
illumined the dark and intricate labyrinths of legal science — 
Poets, who have drawn out thrilling echoes of mingled sub- 
limity and pathos from the lyre of Apollo — Artists, who 
have embodied in the breathing marble and the speaking 
canvass forms of ideal grace and beauty to vie with the 
master-pieces of the chisel and the pencil. But in no de- 
partment has the genius and talent of the country won a 
more brilliant or lasting wreath than in that of popular elo- 
quence. Were it possible to find in this assembly a believer 
in the absurd theory of European Philosophy, that nature 
is degenerate in America, we would triumphantly refer him 
to the roll of her famous orators, whose thrilling and im- 
passioned appeals, the verae voces ab imo pectore, have 
roused a nation to the loftiest transports of resentment, and 
chained the halls of legislation and the chambers of justice 
under the subduing power of their spells. It is a notorious 
fact that many of the finest bursts and the grandest effusions 
of American oratory survive to us only in traditional fame. 
But there is yet enough in its recorded specimens which 
have been preserved upon the enduring tablet of the written 
page, to authorize the assertion that in vigor, animation and 
masculine energy, the eloquence of the American pulpit, bar 
and senate, is equal if not superior to that of the British 
church, forum and parliament. We have filled the sacred 
desk with divines who have expounded with convincing 
power, and enforced with melting pathos the sublime doc- 
trines of the cross. There is nothing in all the imperial splen- 
dor of Chalmers, or the gorgeous magnificence of Robert 
Hall, superior to the intense force and energy of Edwards, the 
celestial fervor of Mason, or the ethereal fire of Bascom. 
Where is the heart that does not beat with a quicker throb 
in rehearsing the thrilling strains of those master-spirits 
Henry and Rutledge, Adams and Lee, who stood forth in 
the great contest of the revolution, the lion-hearted cham- 
pions of liberty and the violated rights of man? Whose en- 



13 

thusiasm does not kindle afresh at the recital of those superb 
^ examples, Ames, Pinckney, and Wirt, Clay, McDuffie, and 
Preston, upon whose fire-touched lips listening senates have 
hung enchanted ? What patriot bosom within the wide cir- 
cle of this confederacy that does not warm with the glow of 
national pride as he recalls the matchless efforts of Daniel 
Webster, of whom, more than of any of his contemporaries, 
it may be said, that the spirit of American institutions filled 
his soul with her glorious presence : — 

"She clothed him with authority and awe, 
Spoke from his lips, and in his words gave law. 
His speech, his form, his action, full of grace, 
And all his country beaming in his face." 

The idea is sometimes advanced that our country has 
already produced her ablest sons, but we are at a loss to 
perceive the foundations of so chimerical an opinion. Why 
should the catalogue of her great and commanding minds be 
already complete, and particularly the list of her eminent 
orators ? The constitution and administration of no other 
* government upon the earth has the same capacity to develop 
moral and intellectual power as the civil and political 
institutions of our own, witnessed in our own written con- 
stitutions, our jury system, the scheme of representation, the 
responsibility of rulers, and the independence of the judici- 
ary. Superadded to the auspices of a government thus es- 
sentially popular, the multiplication of our academical and 
literary institutions, by increasing the stock of national intel- 
ligence and liberalizing public sentiment, will heighten the 
appreciation of oratory, while they supply the incentives 
best adapted to inflame the emulation of aspiring youth. 

And now I know not how I may more profitably employ 
the brief space left to this address, than by the vindication of 
the claims of eloquence from the disparagements which ignor- 
ance and prejudice have heaped upon it. With a view to 
discourage its cultivation, it has been gravely alleged and insist- 
ed that oratory is merely an elegant accomplishment, designed 
to please and entertain, but wholly destitute of all real value 
or practical utility. Have then, those instructions here re- 
ceived been bestowed for no useful end ? Have these socie- 



14 

ties, established and set apart to the improvement of the 
powers of speech, been organized for no valuable object ? 
Sons of this honored institution, need I say that the hours 
appropriated here to these oratorical exercises have been de- 
voted to the acquirement of an art worthy of your most 
earnest and enthusiastic pursuit ; an art, whose empire may 
be pronounced co-extensive with the powers of the human 
intellect, and which is the offspring, the organ and the orna- 
ment of the noblest faculties of our nature. Call you that 
an idle accomplishment which enabled Whitfield to conquer 
the calm resolution of the philosophic mind of Benjamin 
Franklin, and wring from him a contribution to an enterprise 
he had determined to oppose ? Deem you that an empty 
attainment which enabled Sheridan to extort from the friend 
and advocate of Warren Hastings, during that memorable 
trial, the astounding confession that he was the reproach of 
humanity ; shall that be pronounced a worthless instrument 
by which Massillon, in his awful and appalling description 
of the judgment scene, brought his audience to their feet, 
terror-smitten, as by a prophet's voice ? Or, to go farther 
back, what but the resistless accents of Demosthenes could 
have roused the slumbering patriotism of his countrymen, 
baffled the ambitious designs of the crafty tyrant of Mace- 
don, and made him to " quake and tremble on his barbaric 
throne." What but the immortal voice of Tully could have 
subdued the seditious intrigues of Rome's base conspirators, 
and rescued from ruin the trembling fortunes of the com- 
monwealth ? 

" I see thee stand by Freedom's fane, 
Pouring the persuasive strain, 

Giving vast conceptions birth. 
Hark! I hear thy thunder's sound 
Shake the forum round and round, 

Shake the pillars of the earth." 

It is related of Oliver Cromwell that he was alarmed when 
he saw the Oceana of Harrington, and dreaded the effects of 
that volume more than the plots of the royalists. Charles 
the second is said to have trembled at the manuscript of 
Algernon Sydney, and to have procured his condemnation 



15 

through that arbitrary decree, " Scribere est agere." If the 
pen be an instrument of so formidable a character, surely 
the public speaker, clothed with all the persuasive auxili- 
aries of a skillful and cultivated oratory, in a country where 
great and exciting questions are discussed before the popu- 
lar masses in our primary assemblies, must and does wield 
an all-controlling influence. 

Rightly to estimate the sway exerted by the speaker, it 
should be remembered that the charms of a pleasing address, 
and the fascinations of a graceful manner, while they are 
adapted to excite and awaken admiration, neither explain the 
secret nor measure the extent of his dominion over the minds 
of an audience. 

There is implanted in the constitution of our natures a 
principle of sympathy capable of being aroused in the most 
callous breast, which affords the orator a ready medium of 
access to the hearts of those he addresses. By means of this 
subtle quality, outward action, which is the exponent of in- 
ward feeling, becomes, at times, irresistible. The animated 
look, the pathetic utterance, and the impressive, significant 
gesture, witnessing to intensity of feeling and earnestness of 
purpose, awaken kindred emotions in the breast of the mul- 
titude, and enthrone the speaker in an almost absolute 
supremacy. You may be a proficient in all the modes and 
formularies of reasoning, and skilled in the use of all the 
artificial embellishments of language, and yet never win that 
signal triumph of the orator which gives him an undisputed 
empire over the passions of an assembly. You may be a 
consummate master of all the ingenious and adroit processes 
of the dialectician, and be able to marshal, at your will, all the 
stately tropes and brilliant metaphors of the rhetorician, and 
fail to command those priceless keys of which it may be 
said : 

11 This can unlock the gates of joy, 
Of horror that, and thrilling fears, 
Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears. " 

Logic, in the comparison, is a cold and spiritless argument. 
Eloquence is that argument "alive and in motion." Rhe- 
toric is the moulded but inanimate statue of Prometheus — 



16 

Eloquence is that statue instinct with the fire of Heaven. 
Would you know it in the sublimity of its might ? Would 
you behold it in the grandeur and majesty of its awakened 
power ? Go, mingle in the lost and bewildered throng, 
where every sense and sensibility lie smitten under the play- 
ings of its electric fires, and there catch the high idea from 
the glowing sentiment, the fervent pathos, quickened and 
enforced by the beaming countenance, and the dilated form 
of the rapt orator, as kindling with a lofty enthusiasm, the 
stifled breathing and the anxious gaze of a thousand strain- 
ing eyes proclaim him the sovereign oracle of the hour ; 
alo^e conscious of his strength, and collected in his might, 
he now lashes into fury the sleeping elements of human 
passion, or with the wand of the enchanter, charms into 
silence the fierce clamors of anarchy and faction. Stand 
with me a moment in imagination, in the midst of ancient 
Athens, near that rocky eminence from which the patriot 
orator is urging his countrymen to avenge the wrongs and 
check the grasping ambition of Philip. Behold, as he ap- 
peals to their valor and their pride, how the mighty mass 
sway to his stirring tones, like the forests of Hercynia to the 
Northern blasts — and now, as he pours his indignant invec- 
tives against the tyrant king, the half-suppressed murmurs of 
rage rise and swell like the gatherings of a mountain-tempest, 
and burst forth in one furious cry of daring and revenge— 
and now again, as going backward to their ancient fame, he 
conjures them to deeds of glory and renown — the very sides 
of the acropolis ring with the shouts of a zeal that longs for 
the day of battle and the strife of arms. 

This is eloquence! This is that magic power which 
sweeps every chord of the human heart; waking every sen- 
sibility, stirring every passion, and thrilling every nerve of 
feeling. This is that wonderful faculty by which the speak- 
er reigns ascendant over the souls of the multitude, infuses 
all the force and ardor of his own emotions into the breasts 
of his audience, inflaming them with the glow of his own 
enthusiasm, and rousing them to sympathies responsive to 
his own. Yea, this is that almost superhuman attribute 



17 

which speaks as with the awful voice of the thunder, and 
smites, as with the terrible shaft of the lightning— which 
rides upon the neck of the whirlwind and curbs the impetu- 
osity of its fury, or takes its seat upon the bosom of the 
tempest and restrains the violence of its wrath. 

Let it not be inferred, from the importance I have attach- 
ed to what is termed "Delivery," that I seek to fix the im- 
pression that this alone, however highly perfected, compre- 
hends the full idea of an orator. Declamation of itself does 
not comprise the whole of eloquence. He who aspires to 
reach the Alpine heights of oratorical fame will be doomed 
to inevitable disappointment if he despises or neglects the 
important charge of the illustrious Roman, "omnibus discip- 
linis et artibus debet esse instructus orator." 

That brilliant and splendid writer, the celebrated Boling- 
broke, has embodied the spirit of Cicero's injunction in one 
of his own striking and graphic sentences — 

" Eloquence must flow like a stream that is fed by an 
abundant spring, and not spout forth a little frothy stream, 
on some gaudy day, and remain dry the rest of the year." 

He who would prove equal to all that variety of occa- 
sions and diversity of subjects to which the manifold inter- 
ests of communities, and the shifting fortunes of states give 
rise, and who would meet every crisis and emergency to 
which he may be summoned with those pure and effective 
strains, alone productive of lasting results, which shall in- 
struct while they warm, and enlighten while they impress, 
must gather by a patient assiduity the stores a copious and 
extensive knowledge. To stir the heart and to inflame and 
rouse the passions, is, indeed, the high and enviable preroga- 
tive of the gifted speaker; but unless the judgment is simul- 
taneously informed, and the understanding persuaded and 
convinced, his efforts will achieve only a barren and fruitless 
conquest. The most vivid and impetuous bursts of feeling, 
and the most intense and violent agitations of the passions, 
where the intellect is not enlisted, will resemble only those 
fiftful gusts which mark the paroxysms of the storm, wild 
and terrific for an instant, but leaving no enduring trace 
when the swell of the tempest has subsided and the rage of 
3 



18 

the elements is allayed. But not only is specific information 
necessary to the orator, the whole train of the arts and 
sciences and the entire range of knowledge may be made ^ 
tributary to his office. All the various departments of human 
learning will contribute to store the mind with the resources 
of his power, and by invigorating the reason, enhancing the 
faculties of thought, and enlarging the comprehensiveness 
of the intellect, as well as by enriching the fancy and chasten- 
ing the taste, enable the orator to soar upon a bolder wing 
and preserve a longer and a steadier flight. 

Thus supplied with a copious and diversified fund of 
knowledge, and possessed of those refined sensibilities which 
belong to a pure and virtuous heart, he advances to a glo- 
rious mission and an honorable and brilliant career. And 
what can be more animating to the votary of Eloquence 
than the contemplation of that noble, dignified and exalted 
province assigned her in the world. In those seasons when 
the toils and sacrifices incident to its pursuit shall tend to 
chill his enthusiasm and repress his zeal, let him ponder her 
sublime and elevated office, to cripple the progress of error, ( 
and vindicate the sacredness of Truth ; to enforce the claims 
of Religion and foster the interests of virtue ; to plead for 
suffering innocence, to rebuke the wrongs of oppression and 
advocate the cause of Freedom; to encourage the spirit of 
patriotism, to improve the tone of public sentment, to purify 
the model of public character, and promote and uphold all 
those benign institutions in the world whose aim is to honor 
Heaven and to bless mankind. 

These are the obligations of educated mind — these the 
the functions of the cultivated and accomplished Orator. 

Gentlemen of the Societies: — Called by your kind invita- 
tion to the office which I have thus attempted imperfectly to 
discharge, it may not be improper in me to detain you with 
a few parting remarks. 

* In those reveries of imagination, and those musings of 
fancy which have beguiled the vacant hours of your sojourn 
within these collegiate walls, you have contemplated " Fame, 
through clouds, unfold the star that rises o'er her steep" — 
and the vision has doubtless awakened "a wish to climb." 



US v\vV 19 

Actuated by the impulses of a generous ambition, you burn 
and pant for the laurels which shall grace your triumph in 

W those struggles that await you upon the great battle ground 
of the world. To each and to all of you, whatever be the 
respective pursuits in which you may be engaged, the graces 
of a chastened elocution will prove an advantageous acqui- 
sition. But especially to those in your midst, who aspire to 
make "your minds the minds of other men," and mingle 
your names with the sounding echoes of the trump of Fame, 
let me earnestly commend the cultivation and improvement 
of the powers of speech. Many a literary enthusiast has 
plied his unwearied labours in a lonely obscurity, and de- 
scended to the tomb unhonored and unwept — many an ar- 
dent votary of science has exhausted the vigor of manhood 
in studious seclusion, almost unknown beyond the precincts 
of his closet, and left the world forgotten and unmourned; 
while the gifted orator, the master of a flowing and eloquent 
utterance, has been seen to exert a moulding influence up- 
on the mass of surrounding mind, and leave behind him an 

| enduring memorial, impressed upon the features and charac- 
ter of his age. Be assured that that is an erroneous opinion 
which confines the ascendancy of eloquence to the ages of 
antiquity. For, however radical the changes which have 
been wrought in the condition of human Society in the lapse 
of centuries, Man, in those inherent principles which form 
the constitution of his nature, remains emphatically the 
same : — 

" We have one human heart, 
All mortal thoughts confess a common home." 

The history of modern times affords many examples of its 
commanding influence and power. Even under a govern- 
ment less free in its spirit than that which is the boast and 
glory of our own happy land, the name of Sheridan is not 
wanting to recall some of its most brilliant displays and its 
most signal triumphs : 

"When the loud cry of trampled Hindoston 
Arose to Heaven in her appeal from man, 
His was the thunder — his the avenging rod— 
The wrath — the delegated voice of God, 
Which shook ihe nations through hi3 lips, and blazed 
'Till vanquished senates trembled as they praised." 



20 

But especially as American youth, the rising sons of this 
great confederated Republic, are you appealed to by the 
strongest motives which can stimulate your zeal in the unex- 
ampled grandeur of the field over which this attainment is 
to be exerted. 

Unrol the page of universal History, and where, among 
all the famous nations which have preceded us in their 
career of glory, will you produce the parallel ? 

Upon this vast and splendid theatre, surpassing in the 
number and variety of those incentives it offers to the culti- 
vation of Eloquence, all that ancient or modern times have 
elsewhere furnished, you may reap honors commensurate 
with the loftiest soarings of ambition. Such are some of the 
tempting considerations by which I would urge you to the 
study of Eloquence. While you yield to their persuasion, 
nobly resolve to consecrate it in an unfaltering devotion to 
your country's weal, and the cause of Truth, of Justice and 
of Right. 

Above all things, ever remember that he who prostitutes 
his art to vile and unworthy ends, and employs it in subser- 
viency to corrupt and ignoble purposes, challenges the burn- 
ing resentments of the good, and virtuous, and connects with 
his name a lasting infamy. He may win the ready plaudits 
of the multitude, and make them, for a season, the pliant 
instruments of his unholy schemes, but he will be finally 
met and overwhelmed with the blasting execrations of 
Society. 

In conclusion, Gentlemen, permit me to express the heart- 
felt wish that all those buoyant hopes which now animate you 
may be realized, and the rectitude of your lives furnish an 
example worthy of imitation* 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 

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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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